Adventuring About

"Let all creation rejoice before the Lord, for he comes, he comes to judge the earth. He will judge the world in righteousness and the peoples in his faithfulness."

Psalm 96:13

 

On my days off, nothing helps me feel better about life than adventuring around. 

 

There is truly no better way to explain what I do except "adventuring". It literally entails driving up forest roads, pulling off at certain points that look interesting and walking into the woods. No trail. No destination. Just a camera, some food and water. Adventure.

I come across animals, dead and alive, archaeological sites, meadows, cattle corrals, old homestead houses and lots of trees and grass.

My plan today wasn't even to go adventuring. I had planned to go to Lockett Meadow because I haven't been there in over three years and take some photos of the blooming aspens. Unfortunately (or maybe fortunately) the road was closed. I turned around and found Forest Road 418 which has been on my list of roads to explore. It circumnavigates the North side of the San Francisco Peaks, which are impossible to miss from Flagstaff.

I spent about 3 hours out in the woods today and found my first pair of antlers, a couple more elk skeletons, tons of aluminum cans (my dad and I collect them to recycle), a red tailed hawk and some spectacular views.

Enjoy the photos and take a gander at photos from other adventures at my photography site.

A Growing Community

"¹ Praise the Lord.

Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good;
    his love endures forever.

² Who can proclaim the mighty acts of the Lord
    or fully declare his praise?
³ Blessed are those who act justly,
    who always do what is right."

-Psalm 106: 1-3 

 I have been given a great opportunity lately and through the whole process, the glory of God and his work in people is very evident.

I am going to share the story of meeting Dennis Gable for the first time and I hope he doesn't mind me saying all of this. 

As many of you know, I am a photographer. I am kind of in a transition period of not necessarily wanting to promote myself too much before moving but wanting to continue to do some jobs and drum up work. One of my pushes to drum up work was getting a hold of this brand new growing community called Get Local AZ. The foundation of this community is to support local business, but you'll see the vision of the founder is quite a bit more spiritual. 

I contacted them through their website about a month or so ago about becoming a provider for the community. That would entail buying into the group, receiving some "discount cards" and reselling those to clients as a way to both promote my business and give my customers a discount on their services with me as well as every other business in the community.  The problem lies in the fact that I would be the only provider in Northern Arizona. Trying to sell a card for $20 that gives you discounts to businesses that you aren't located by is like trying to sell a tornado shelter to someone in California. 

However, Dennis, who is a co-founder, mentioned that they will be looking for an intern to help grow this community in the north land. Well, I am perfect for this. I know business owners, I am a Flagstaff local, I have connections. Plus, if i promote and grow the community in Flagstaff, that will help me sell my cards more quickly. I'm in.

Dennis and I conversed a bit over email the next couple weeks and then he said that they would be traveling up to Flagstaff and would like to meet. Perfect. 

I already knew that Dennis was connected to YoungLife and I knew that some of my friends had heard of him and were actually led by him when they were in high school. I knew that he was a Christ follower and that made this meeting much more than just a business lunch. 

Dennis and his partner at Get Local AZ, Danny are both incredible guys. They have a passion for this because it's about more than just supporting the local business community. They want to see this community become an evangelistic tool for Arizona. Just as in Jesus' time, people had to rely on other believers for food, shelter, necessities that they couldn't get from those persecuting them. The vision behind this Get Local AZ community is to become the support network for people needing services. It is the modern version of the historical foundation. I think that is pretty cool. And something that I would support even if I didn't have a business interest in it.

If you live in Arizona and would like to get more information about Get Local AZ, purchase a discount card, or become a provider, write me a comment on here and I will be sure to connect you to the right people!

Earth and All Stars

^"3He heals the brokenhearted
and binds up their wounds.
⁴ He determines the number of the stars
and calls them each by name.
⁵ Great is our Lord and mighty in power;
his understanding has no limit."
- Psalm 147: 3-5


There are a few things in my life that make me truly understand the greater power of our Lord. Most of them are seen in nature and most are usually too awesome to explain in words. Two of those things are similar. The sunrise and the sunset. Although, the sunrise has more powerful emotions behind it as the dawning of a new day has spiritual and biblical connotations that the sunset sometimes lacks.

Another example, and the one I am going to talk about further, is the night sky.

God created the sky and evening on the second day. Two days later, God made lights to separate day and night and created the stars. (Genesis 1:16) He is so great even, that we cannot fathom the number of stars and yet, He knows them by name as the verse of the day reads at the top of the post.

To me, the stars stand as one of the greatest displays of God's awesome power. To me, he created the stars only as something gorgeous and mesmerizing to look at. They hardly ever change, besides their nightly and yearly rotation, and yet, they are always fascinating and new. The universe, the Milky Way, planets, worm holes, black holes, supernovas, what ever the astronomical event, it is amazing and divinely created.

Wednesday was a new moon night, which for a photographer is the ultimate time to go out and photograph the stars as there is no sky light to interrupt the multitude of stars. Unfortunately, there were some storms rolling through and it wasn't an ideal night to photograph. However, as per usual, the moon takes roughly 15 days to build back to full and there are still a couple of days in which star viewing is possible without light interruption. I took my chance, despite evening clouds and daytime breezes and went out to Lake Mary to see what I could see.

I have been blessed to grow up in a city renowned for it's dark skies. In general, Northern Arizona and Southern Utah have some of the clearest, darkest skies in the country. More specifically, Flagstaff is the world's first International Dark Sky City. Only three other cities in the world have the same designation. Lowell Observatory, located in Flagstaff, discovered Pluto back in 1930 by a gentleman named Clyde Tombaugh. Lowell is also known for a few other discoveries despite it's small notoriety.

Unfortunately our eyes are not sensitive enough to capture all the light that is available in the night sky even when there is no moon out. Fortunately, new cameras do have the capability with the right equipment. And on one of those clear moonless nights, a camera can capture all the majesty that God has placed in the Heavens for us to enjoy.

P.S. You just had a Bible, Geography, History, Anatomy and Philosophy lesson rolled into one. Who said the internet is bad for you.